Osmania University is forced to borrow money from its engineering and technology college to adjust the deficit in payment of salaries reflecting the financial situation of the university.
Last month the administration secured a loan of Rs. 3 crore from the OU College of Engineering and College of Technology that had surplus funds to pay the salaries of January.
However, it is confident of repaying the money once it receives funds under the Block Grant given by the government and also the funds raised through examination fee and affiliation fee collected from students and colleges respectively. That money will be generated at the beginning of the next academic year in June .
Meanwhile, the government has proposed to pay Rs. 166 crore as Block Grant for the university in the budget introduced recently. Though there is substantial increase compared to last year when OU got only Rs. 113 crore, the University still falls short of Rs. 70 crore to meet its salary bill. The varsity has been financially burdened with the adoption of new pay scales since 2008 and it has been using its surplus funds to pay salaries. Surplus fund was created during the regime of Prof. D.C. Reddy for taking up developmental works and it was strictly avoided for paying salaries and pensions.
The OU Vice-Chancellor, S. Satyananarayna, said that lot of efforts were put for the increase in Block Grant, but he agreed that the varsity will still fall short. With regard to loan from engineering college, he said they had to borrow money to pay salaries. “The salary and pension bill per month is around Rs. 19 crore and we generally borrow from various sources within the varsity and repay whenever grants are released.”
Some officials said the government has been pressurising the varsity to use its internal funds to adjust the increased salaries and pensions. Prof. Satyanarayana, however, is hopeful that some additional funds will come for development with the university getting the UPE status from the University Grants Commission (UGC). “We are expecting around Rs. 70 crore in the 12th plan starting from April this year and that would be used for developmental works only.”
